The Labor Department said Thursday that applications for unemployment benefits ticked up slightly last week, but number of applications, 352,000 in all, was seen as more evidence that a terrible jobs report for March was an anomaly.

After the closing bell, the tech sector weighs in with earnings from IBM, Google and Microsoft.

The sector has been rattled this week by some unsettling data. Shares of Apple Inc. tumbled to a 52-week low Wednesday after a forecast from one of its suppliers hinted at a slowdown in demand for iPhones and iPads.

After the market closed Wednesday, eBay posted strong quarterly earnings, but its outlook sent shares of the e-commerce company sliding. Shares of eBay fell more than 3 percent in premarket trading Thursday, but it's still close to an all-time high.